


Before You and After You

by Shyam_Xt



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: - - Freeform, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-23
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2020-03-10 04:28:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18931279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shyam_Xt/pseuds/Shyam_Xt
Summary: Will Graham wakes up in the hospital to find Hannibal Lecter has disappeared. Jack Crawford waits till Will fimds Hannibal again. Hannibal waits for Will to act. Margot is worried and asks for a favour.





	1. After the Cliff

**Author's Note:**

> Will is frustrated and angry but moreover needs answers. Hannibal, as usual plays his own game confusing everybody.

He heard the bluff was eroding.

Again and again the tinder accent of his voice was calling his name, he craved to here over and over again. He couldn't understand why he couldn't feel the warmth of his body or hear the beat of his heart.   
He remembered listening to his heart beyond his aching battlescars. He remembered the black blood in the moonlight and embracing him, holding on to his body while being suspended over roiling Atlantis. He remembered how much he wanted to let go of himself and feel alive, swim far far away to a different world and just be happy.

And the bluff was still eroding.

He opened his eyes, inhaled the air filled with medicine and anticeptic cleaner. The machine beeped and a doctor walked in. 'How are you feeling?'

'Where am I?' He avoided thequestion, looked around him to catch glimpse of him sitting by. 'Where is he?' He inquired again.

'You mean 'she!' She left. The FBI will be here soon.' 

'How long have I been here?' He tried to sit stubbornly.

'Not long. Just relax. You are find. You lost blood.' The doctor helped him to sit and gave him water.   
When the doctor had left he tried to put the pieces together and tried to assume what had happened. He had help. Either Chyion or Bedelia was there. He knew he had just a couple of hours before Jack Crawford walks in through the hospital door. He knew he had to hurry beyong every ache and pain.

Eventually with throbbing pain and black patches obscuring his vision time to time, he managed to find his house near the cliff. The dead dragon was not anymore. The garden was cleaned. Blood stains were washed but the broken glass was not fixed. 

The bluff was still eroding. 

He went inside without knocking half hoping he would be sitting somewhere in his calm reading a book or in his spotless clean gleaming kitchen cooking. broken glasses and spilt wine was cleaned. Everything was profoundly organized and kept in perfect order. 

'Typical him!' Will Graham muttered. The house was fillled with his fragrance. His sweet smelling hair. His fresh skin. His pressed tailored suites. He was everywhere.   
He writhed in seering pain in his scars, in his head, in his heart. He loathed him for giving him this misery. He wanted nothing but to give him the same pain, same hurt of abandonment. He fantasized killing him over and over again. He could live a peaceful life without him. He can't live without him. He won't breathe without him as though he would as well die with him. 

He sighed looking around. He felt something was waiting in the still house. Something was calling his name. He looked around hopefully. Then he saw the envelope with a neatly packed small box on it.   
He read his name written on it. He touched the neat flawless handwriting on the evelope. He wanted to throw it into the fire and never know what was in and destroy everything finding him. And then hold him in his hands. Feel the musical calm of his beating heart. Kill him softly with his bare hands. And then die by his side and be just gone.

Yet he has written this letter for him. He might have sat at his gleaming, scrupulously organized table and wriiten this letter in his usual undisturbed flawless stance. He loved sitting in his chair, at his table where he worked, embracing savouring his last working hour which he had saved for him, waiting for him to come back, with his closed door and his warm arms wide open. No one was allowed in his sweet dwelling but Will knew he barged in unnvited, in his usual arrogance cutting off everything else he bonded with maliciously.  
....

Jack Crawford stopped beside the stolen car and walked over to the man who sat gazing at the ocean at the edge of the cliff. The vast blue sky touching the deep blue green ocean created the optical illusion but we all accepted nature's trick and admired. Away from daunting human pig sty, with ocean and sky and the cliff with bluff eroding he might have found peace. And he brought Will to his hidden nest away from civilized pigs. It was no secret to Jack Crawford that Will had alrady found this well hidded love nest in his heart and comfortably settled in there. It was more like Will climbed over a wall, opened many closed doors in his usual arrogance and found a home for himself and Doctor Lecter had no say in that but try secure this difficult soul. Crawford was wise enough to see a perspective. He was wise enough to see Will Graham would always end up where he belonged. Where he chose to belong.

'You stole a car from the hospital.' He announced neutrally. He didn't look back but hid the letter beneath his jacket. 

'I borrowed it!'  
Jack Crawford stood beside him looking down the cliff. Waves banged against the land ferociously overwhelming, embracing coating it with salty waters as though claiming a reckoning and then retrieted angrilly but came back over and over again to make out with the land. Land waited with his arms wide open allowing the beloved ocean to own him.  
'The bluff is eroding!' He said.

'That's what he said.' Will mumbled through his gritted teeth. 'He's gone Jack....and I don't know where he had gone.' 

'The hospital said you had left uninformed.'

'I was desperate.'

'To catch him? Kill him? Run away with him?' Jack crawford eyed him narrowly. 

Will did not look back. He continued to gaze at the vast sky touching the green sea where everything was calm and undisturbed. Perhaps thats where they have to fly to. Swim to. He turned to face Jack. 'What's the difference?'

'You ran away with him.'

'I have already told you Jack, a part of me would always want to.'

'And I told you to cut off that part.'

'He saved my life Jack. He knew the Dragon was after me, not him.'

'Because he influenced the Dragon.'

'Or I influenced the Dragon to kill him! You never know.' 

'You think the Dragon manipulated you to get Lecter out?' Jack Crawford raised his eyes for the first time in utter disbelief.

Will calculated looking at the ocean now a cruise ship sailing in her peace along the horizen. Unlike his voyage the cruise captain knew where he was going. Through storms and dispute he had a compass and a route. Perhaps Will also had already known where he had been going but simply had hidden it deep inside of him like a letter from that deepest desire. Until the right moment came. 

'I wanted him out.'

'As a bait to catch the dragon.' Jack Crawford added.

Will laughed finally standing up to face Jack Crawford fully. The FBI was collecting data and investigting the house as if it was a crime scene. Agents were walking here and there discussing and collecting stuff. He shook his head sardonically. 'The fact is Jack,... ' he paused peeping at the waves hitting the land for a while, while Jack waited. '...naming the bait. You catch the fish if you name the bait after the one you cherrish, and if he cherrishes you back.'  
He walked towards an FBI SUV without paying the slightest attention to the officers sealing the house and investigating the surrounding. He knew the world was a small place but it's a vast arena where eveybody watched when you performed. He must be living a new role. Somewhere glamourous and authentic. He wouldn't do clandoustine. He's, theatrical.   
....

Somewhere in the middle of regal, majestic and gracious, a man was standing near a window watching the golden lights and streets and colours striding here and there as if unseen painter is painting his murderous art. A woman dressed in black sat in a cosy armchair watching him.

'He came looking for you.' She said quietly.

The man moved towards the other armchair in front of her, unbuttoned his custom tailored Vicuna jacket and sat.   
'Did he find my note or did the FBI find it?'

'He found it.'

'Did he read it?' He knew too well to look anywhere but at the woman when he asked it. He bit his lip, struggled slightly in his chair looking at the window.

She smiled serenly. 'He was devastated, broken, desperate,...' she stopped giving him time to drink in the detail, watching him attentively. 

He did drink in the detail, unable to sit anymore in the chair walked towards the window. 

'He hid it from the FBI.... He will read it in his solidute to be entagled with whatever is left of you.' she completed feeling sympathatic for him.

'I want to see him.' He walked towards a cupboard where sparkling glasses of all shapes, for all beverages were stored, took two wine glasses out. 

'Oh he will do everything to draw your attention.' She smiled again accepting the glass thankfully from him now half full of pink wine. 'But im curious. Why did you leave him?'

'I never left him Chyon, and he never left me.' 

Doctor Hannibal Lecter sat back with his glass of wine now in a perfectly passive motion, his expression calm and gaze cold.  
....

After a long day at the FBI, facing interviews, answering, ignoring, suppressing the urge to bite the faces off the nosy reporters he slumped to an armchair of the FBI field office Baltimore Maryland. He rubbed his eyes and brushed his curls off his forhead before grunting in pure loath at the shadow fell upon him blocking the light.   
'How did you get in Freddy? Who let you in here?'

'Jack Crawford.' She sat infront of him sweeping her vicious curls off her shoulders taking her camera out.

'Tell him it's not gonna happen this time.' He stood up snatching his coat to leave.

'You ran away with him,' she remarked provoking him to strike back, and added, 'again.'

He waited before answering and walking away without allowing her to catch a glimps of his face on camera, 'And I will, again.'

Jack Crawford entered the room with a grim, half satisfied smile on his face and sat where Will Graham was sitting. He hasn't lost his confidance and determination. Beneath the battle scars and years of pain and achievements he still wore courage and hope.   
'Freddie Lounds,'

'Didn't work the way you expected Agent Crawford. He even smells like him.' She packed her recorder and camera in her side bag eyeing him intently. Jack nodded thoughtfully and sighed a deep sigh tappping the arm of the chair. 

'He always smelt like him ever since they knew each other existed.'

'Do you think you can catch him again?'

Jack Crawford smiled his smug smile and shook his head. 'No, we don't catch him Freddie Lounds, Will Graham does.'  
.....

Two days passed accumilating agitation like a brimming cup waiting to spill before it simmers down. Jack Crawford waited.   
Tattlecrime.com reached more than a million of views on its latest post of 'Murder Husbands.' The FBI special consultant's clever plot to save his psychopath friend, their spectacular runaway and the dissapearance of the Great Red Dragon.   
The expected storm did not arise despite the unusual thick quiet occupied the atmosphere. It was as though every crime ceased, thunderstruck to witness the next best hurricane of Doctor Hannibal Lecter.

He pourd his daily glass of whiskey before going to bed when his pack of adopted family stood up alert. Now that he moved back to Wolf Trap, Virginia with his usual family because he had said farewell to the humans he had chosen to live with, because he had chosen to run away with his one human. Perhaps not even his human but his demon.   
He kept the glass aside and opened the door. Coming out of the brand new Mercedes AMG GT4 was exclusively dressed, wearing heavy make up on her fearless determined face was Margot Verger. 

She came in uninvited, removed her leather gloves and patted the dogs. Thinking and asuming though skeptical, he closed the door and waited for her to break the ice.   
'It's been a while since we were alone in this place.' She sat without invitation and looked at him with same fearless determined eyes.

'Same question Margot. What is the owner of the famous meat paking dynasty doing in my house?'

'I'm not the owner. I don't have the right parts for the proclivities.' She smiled.

Will sat facing her quietly. She spent a few seconds observing his unhealed wounds and tired face as though she was trying to see someone else. He felt she was skimming through his eyes and skin and scars to catch a glimpse of another soul coiled wrapped, entangled.   
'He's all over you.' 

'Figures.' He laughed scathingly. 'Are you here because she sent you here or...' He stopped halfway and poured a glass of whiskey.

'I have my own reasons. Besides, how is he...? Do you know where he is?'

'Oh!' he nodded confirming his doubts to himself, supressing a sardonic smile giving the glass to her. 'Even if I knew, what makes you think I would tell you Mrgot? In fact I ran away with him, twice, and always will, and everybody knows it.'

Margot accepted the glass from him and drank in silence. 'You understand him. I thought you would understand me because I understand him too.' She remarked quietly looking at the once broken window where a lost stag had stormed in. 'He was right about my brother and me. He didn't kill him the first time he got the chance. He waited for the Verger baby.' 

'He didn't kill him because he wanted me to kill him.' Will observed her closely.

Margot grinned. 'No he wanted me to kill him. He, of all people knew you were not a killer Will. Never will be. It's righteous violence he made both of us practice.' 

'Since when have you started psychoanalysing people...?' Will walked towards the window and looked at the moon shining, making odd shadows on the yard. He stared at the moon for a while and walked back.

'Since Alana Bloom.' She smiled.

'Oh...!' He nodded. 

'He saved me from my brother.' 

Will Sat back drinking the remaining of the glass and sighed. 'Trust me Margot, he saved me from myself.' He smiled at her and shook his head. 'But I don't know where he is. Are you worried about Alana?'

She calculated and took ample time to drink on before answering. Or asking him the very question, had been bothering her for so long.   
'Why would you do that?'

'Why would I do what?' He raised his eyebrows dramatically. 

'Knowing it would not stop him, knowing he would smell it out of her, knowing he would withdraw himself fron her, why would you give her a gun?'   
She tilted her head to one side to eye him closely, to capture his every blink of an eye, every breath intake. However, he wore his usual emotionless face, and drank the remaining of his glass. 

'I wanted to protect her.'

Magot let a soft smile flash across her make up.   
'Or did you crave him that much that you wanted to alienate him from her, so he has nothing but you?'

He didn't change his expression, kept gazing at Margot with his dead eyes. 'You got a decent carrier for your Verger baby, it served you well.'

She finished her whiskey and walked towards the window where two dogs were stting peacefully not minding this visitor.  
'Do you know Alana made a bargain with Doctor Lecter to save your life at Muscrat farm.'

Will Graham laughed, out loud, that the dogs looked up licked, shook their heads woofed softly and went back to their rest. He laughed, drank more and laughed angrily. He placed his empty glass on the table and rubbed his weary face.  
'Do you really think Doctor Lecter would leave me to die...? Do you really think your brother really caught him? Do you really think he was going to die in that torture house?' He let out through gritted teeth calculating every word, articulating with prominent adoration and sarcasm. 'If you only knew him like I do.' His voice became milder and smoother and Margot continued to remain in silence.  
He walked towards the door and stood beside her and watched the moonlight crept through the boughs painting the ground. He did not hear coyotes anymore nor saw stags. Margot nodded liteneing to the light breeze singing in the moonlight outside. 

'I appreciate what he did to help me. I really do.' She paused and sighed. 

'You think I'm responsibal for Doctor Lecter's threat. You think I can undo it.' He stated neutrally. 'Alana Bloom is responsible for what happened to Doctor Chilton.' 

'Both of you.' She corrected quietly. 

'She shouln't have removed his books, drawings, and the toilet Margot. That was discourteous. And discourtesy is ugly. Doctor Lecter is prone to old fashion politeness. You do not disrespect him,' He utterd smoothly.

'Will he kill all of us?'

'You all owe him. I don't know. I don't think he would.' He shrugged moving away from the window. 'Don't worry. He has more on his plate to deal with Alana.' 

'Are you going to find him?' She smiled.

'Eventually.'He smiled back.

'What did your wife say about this?' 

His expression didn't change. 'What do you think?'

'She was smart enough not to get attached to you, given a part of you had always been with him.' Margot smiled.

He chuckled and tucked a few strands of her hair behind her ear and stroked her pretty face with his finger.'You should go now.'

He waited and watched until the tail lights were out of sight and closed the doors.   
.....

'I want my job back Jack, that's why I'm here.'

Jack Crawford openly let out a broad smile, frowned, clicked his tongue, thought for a while, stood up, walked to the coffee machine, filled a cup, placed it infront of Will, sat back and frowned again.  
'You do realise the entire FBI knows that you ran away with him?' He shot a stern look at him who sat carelessly comfortable and smug.

'I came back to stop the dragon. I stopped the dragon. That's it.' he let out smoothly in hs soft dangerous tone.

'We didn't find the body of the dragon though he stopped,' Jack Crawford leaned forward and placed his hand on the table to peep in to his eyes carefully who stared back undisturbed and did not blink. 

'Well then the Dragon ran away with him, not me. Im here.' 

Jack Crawford drank his coffee and observed his unkempt hair, unpressed cloths, not-shaved face. 'When was the last time you slept?'

'Yesterday night. I'm under control. What you expected from Doctor Lecter. He did his job very well. So here I am.' He leaned back against the chair and gazed back comfortably. Not even a single muscle twitched in his face. 

After a long pause of silent consideration Jack Crawford talked more to himself than to Will observing the photographs scattered in front of him, 'I could use a profiler.' 

A few minuted after Will Graham had left, his phone rang to inquire the sudden request he had just received.  
'Yes Freddie Lounds but may I ask if you have spies in the FBI or you have bugged me in any unorthodox way?' 

'Will Graham just called me.'

Her answer made him smile his odd smile and nod affirmatively.  
'Yes Freddie Lounds, He started working for the FBI on his own will.'


	2. Don't you cry my baby it'll be alright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will gets his wish back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal visits Will but the FBI is on the watch. Will and Jack have a heart to heart chat about Hannibal.

Cleaning his gun or mending a part of a boat engine, he waited.

When he didn't hear a vehicle approaching but a knock on the door and the dogs didn't bark but raised their ears interested and started wagging the tails, he paid the closest attention. He left his shotgun which he was cleaning aside and walked towards the door slowly.

He was standing undisturbed, quite calm and steady, holding a paper bag, and carrying a leather bag. 

'Hello Will!' His usual polite address was precise.

'Hello Doctor Lecter.' He uttered smoothly.

'May I come in?'

Will moved aside inhaling his fragrance of pressed clothes, perfume, hair spray and shaving lotion trying to identify each separately.

He walked in, placed his bags on the coffee table and removed his Vicuna traveling cloak.   
Will closed the door drew the curtains and walked towards Hannibal Lecter. 'What's that?' He pointed to the paper bag in his very well accustomed abrupt manner.

'Dog food!' He let out indifferently.

'And that?' Will pointed to the other.

'Medicine.' Again he stated calmly hanging his coat next to Will's.

"Oh!' Will nodded in mock interest at the visitor who was walking towards him eyeing carefully with his both hands in his pockets.  
'Did you read my note?'

"Yes!'

'Then why didn't you continue your medication? You lost a lot of blood. Your wounds are not healed. And you are drinking.'

'And that's why you are here, Doctor Lecter? Is this...... therapy all over again...?' He let out in smooth sarcasm suppressing the urge to throw him against some wall and strangle him, feel the warm pulse beneath his warm skin under his palm, and then beat him to death.   
Hannibal Lecter smiled sensing his wild desire in his glowering eyes and opened the paper bag. Will watched him distributing dainties among the yapping squeaking pack around him. He watched him for a while with his gaze getting milder and softer. Then he blinked embracing his sight and sighed contented.  
Hannibal turned to accept the glass of Whiskey and nodded thanking him and placed the neatly folded empty paper bag in the bin. 'Why did you join the FBI again? I've explained very well why you should not.' 

'Oh you know very well why I did it and told Freddie Lounds about it.' Will shot curtly walking past him to replace the bottle of whiskey on the shelf.

Hannibal Lecter pondered swallowing his thoughts and nodded. He placed his glass on the shelf next to the bottle and faced Will who was standing leaning against it watching him, drinking in every detail. 'Apparently, Jack Crawford knows why you did that.' He gazed at him with mild anxiety and admiration. 

Will Graham, feeling the familiar warmth emitting from him shrugged stuffing his hand in his pocket and started fidgeting slightly. Yet when Hannibal placed his hand on his cheek he stood motionless making ever blood cell of him stop then and there. He closed his eyes and waited. He felt his luxurious touch on the cheek, brushing his curls off his neck urging him to turn and tilt his head.  
Hannibal removed the dressing on the neck, released him and walked to get the leather case.

Will opened his eyes, walked to the window to look outside. 'How many of them were there? Did you kill them?'

'Tell Jack Crawford that I'm a psychiatrist and can modify memories.' He gestured Will towards him.

'Are you going to modify mine too?' He walked back obeying. 

'I don't have to. You could let everything go away. Put your head back, close your eyes, wade in to the quiet of the stream.' He smiled serenely sweeping away his stubborn chocolate curls off his neck.

Will shook his hand off his neck to look at him. He gazed biting the mounting unknown pain in his throat. He eyes burnt, his chest swell, he just stared back with his lips slightly apart trying to speak words he did not have. Hannibal continued cleaning his wound gently. Will gave up. He waited the same speechless stance when he unbuttoned his shirt to examine the stab wound on his chest. He made him sit and cleaned the wound and then he cleaned his hands and fingers, one by one, tenderly, until the oil stains and the dust, completely removed. He sat and closed his eyes absorbing every touch motionless. 

'You should be careful. You might catch a virus.' 

'I'm scarred all over Doctor Lecter. Probably immune to all viruses.' He mumbled quietly when he medicated the wounds and caressed every scar on his torso. Smiled faintly when he felt his warm fingers on the surgical cut. He just waited like a child when his shirt was removed and dressed in a freshly laundered one. He sat in perfect nonchalant tone inhaling the soothing medicine smell and his fragrance and listening to his calm breathing. 

'Drink this. Will?' 

He opened his eyes and drank what he was given with no questions and followed him where he was cleaning the glasses. He enjoyed the luxury of his beloved company standing next to him, not saying much but listening to his remarks of the victims the FBI was investigating while cleaning the several things in the surrounding, disposing of the old plasters and bandages, and cleaning the place. The same scent of sharing moments in his study, at his desk, sitting in his chair, in his dining room or his kitchen, his heart, his mind, his time and space. Everything. Will recalled triumphantly of how he broke the Trojan wall of his heart and trespassed and occupied every bit of it stubbornly. He felt dizzy though he was leaning against a wall next to Hannibal. 

'What did you give me?' He shook his head to shake off the sleepy feeling, frowning at him in disbelief.

'A sedative. Sleep.' Hannibal wiped his hands and carefully obtained his coat and gloves. He couldn't help a grin colouring his polite affectionless expression when Will casually moved and stood blocking the exit. 'You can't stand long like that Will, go to bed.'

'Where can I find you?' He swayed dangerously fighting the spinning head and the blurring vision.

Hannibal did not answer but held him when he had almost fallen on to him and embraced him for support, clinging to him and resting his head on his shoulder.

'Doctor Lecter,' He mumbled while sleep was creeping into his sedated mind. Hannibal stroked his curls warming his drowsy mind to the sleep. His breathing calm, his body heavier, and grip loosening. Finally he gave up the fight and greeted the comfortable sleep in his arms muttering one last word.

'Hannibal.'  
....

The next day Will entered Jack Crawford's office expecting a grim face but he was in an oddly amused mood.   
Jack Crawford managed not to raise his eyebrows at the sight of Will Graham when he entered emitting a finer fragrance, in pressed clothes, combed hair, with radiant skin and looking perfectly healthy. 

'He is all over you.'

He sat wearing his glasses and looking directly at Jack nodding. 'He's not all over me Jack, he is in me. I feel like walking with him and I hear his voice with noise and clarity in my head.'

'Why didn't you runaway with him?'

'Oh he drugged me and left me in my cold bed.' Will raised his eyes and uttered carelessly. 

Years of dealing with this unusual crazy, had made Jack Crawford not react to any of what he was told but chose to observe him in his eyes not to find any hidden information because he knew Will Graham would not hide any but at the same time would protect what he wanted to protect, but to see the shadow of the psychiatrist oozing from him. Hannibal Lecter had severely scraped out his autism and instability that he sat quite undisturbed, very solid with a dead gaze. Jack Crawford smiled. 'He's still playing you Will.'

'He's playing all of us. He always did.' He looked away and thought for a while before replying. 'He once asked me to leave with him, no sacrifice. He tested me. He wanted to stop. I didn't let him. I was supposed to save him. I failed. He made me guilty of Abigail Hobbs' death for real. He won't ask again. I have to find him.'

'Will you bring him down when you do that?' Jack Crawford stood up and walked towards the notice board. He removed a few photographs and placed in front of Will and presented him with a firearm.

'He allowed me to make that choice, to save myself. The promise he made to Alana Bloom.' Will smoothly remarked accepting the firearm. 

'He let you kill him?' Jack sat back with a mild smile. 'He knew you would never.'

Will ignored, examining the pictures. The stab wounds and drawing the cross on the forehead. 

'Did you discuss these with him before he drugged you?'

He didn't raise his head but answered indifferently, 'Yes he helped me profile them.'

'Just like old times,' Jack remarked.

'Just like old times,' He agreed with a sudden soft beam of light flashing across his radiant skin.

....

He entered his luxurious magnificent bedroom of vintage furniture, an old fashion fire place and walls containing medeavel paintings. He placed his car keys on the dressing table and removed his shining crocodile leather shoes and socks. he had started unbuttoning his shirt when he smelt the finer shaving lotion and not the unfortunate brand.

'It's the one I left you with the letter.' He smiled not stopping his task.

'Yeah, since you have an obsession with my shaving lotion.' Will Graham stood up from the arm chair he was sitting. 'Hello Doctor Lecter'

He turned smoothly in his unbuttoned shirt,' Hello Will! Forgive me for not being dressed properly.'

'I trespassed doctor.'

'It's not the first time.' He smiled with a shade of mild accusation mixed with admiration towards his stubbornness. 

Will smiled avoiding his gaze stuffing his hands in his pockets. 

'When did you arrive?'

'Yesterday. Took a few hours to track the house. But I was tired and slept for a while before coming to see you.' He came closer and looked up in his amber eyes. 'When did you see the trackers?' 

Hannibal Lecter walked closer and held the side of his neck to examine the healed wounds and smiled. 'When you were falling asleep on my shoulder calling my name.' 

Will waited until he had finished his physical examination and shot with mild reproach. 'I don't remember much because you drugged me.'

He chuckled softly, caressed the back of his neck and let go. He walked away removing his shirt revealing the marks of the silent battle he fought for just one person. One person he truly loved. One person he bled on. One person he failed to express his immense adoration. 'You have to excuse me. I have to have a wash.'

Will did not pay attention to what Hannibal Lecter was saying for he frowned at he burnt mark on his back. He ran his fingers on it two three times lost in thoughts. 'He tortured you.' He touched smoothly the old scars on his wrists and the bullet wound on his lower torso. 'I scarred you all over Doctor Lecter.' He whispered painfully. He wanted to embrace him then and there, kiss his sweet smelling skin but continued running his fingertips on the scars.

'Yes you did.' Hannibal smiled.

'For all these that I'm guilty of.' His painful gaze caught his mild caring amber gaze. 'Why me Doctor Lecter? You should've, could've, would've stepped back, walked away when you could, save Abigail, and save yourself. But why me?'

Hannibal skimmed his gaze for a few moments and withdrew himself gently and left to the bath. 

Will walked around examining the room. The gleaming dressing table, several bottles of perfume, hair spray and hand lotion; four poster king size bed with neat white sheets and a golden brown quilt matched with the red and green walls and a walk in closet. He opened the closet and just stood there. He wasn't mesmerized or thunderstruck. His body just became rigid. He swallowed, sighed and blinked softly nodding as if understanding something.   
The closet was divided in to two. Suits on one side with matching shoes ties and cufflinks and bow ties. Tailored casual jackets, pullovers, shirts trousers leather ankle boots and Chelsea boots with labels on the other side for a second man. Every item in the closet had a brother of a different style. He closed the closet door and walked out.

Hannibal did not move or flinch when he heard the door of his upscale bathroom open and close. He closed his eyes when he heard the shower door sliding open and close. He stood breathless feeling the warm breath on the back of his neck. He stood motionless when he embraced him. His cold hands stroking his chest, his cheeks and stubble pressed in between his shoulder blades. He savoured it for a few minutes and turned to face him. He removed his wet clothes, caressed his scars, washed his chocolate curls, cleaned him, consoled his stubborn disturbed soul and let him spend long moments embracing him in a mute exchange of many an adoration, accusation, dangerous revelation, flat threats, cradling him wrapping him in a soundless lullaby. He let him hold on to his body and wouldn't let him go either for the conjoined understanding of ticking time and space and death lingering in the corner to drag them apart.   
Will listened to the beat of the heart. The remarkably lean organ, yet such a potent symbol of life and the thing that makes him human. Good and bad, love and ache, everything, feeling the blood and breath, the elements of two lives conjoined just as it happened over the roiling Atlantis. At the edge of the cliff. 

Bluff is still eroding. But nothing mattered anymore. Until death do them apart they would hold on, cling on with the single thought ringing, shimmering in their minds.

'Before you and after you, yours.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will finds out where Hannibal lives.

**Author's Note:**

> Will makes a drastic decision to lure Hannibal back in to his life.


End file.
